Wednesday and its a self maintenance day. I’m up and showering early with an hour and a half to go before my dentist appointment. A long clean of the teeth and morning meds and I am out of the door to walk down the road to my dentist. I book in at reception and settle down with David Sedaris’s Naked while I wait to be called in. After a while I am shepherded into the clinical room and the couch of pain. I’m here to have a filling and preparation for a crown. For the full hour I am mouth stretched open. I get injected with anaesthetic to start with before the work on the tooth to be crowned begins. There is a lot that goes on but finally its ready for a temporary cap. The dentist produces a wizard piece of scan kit. No longer is a mouthful of sticky plaster in a tray required, this new equipment scans my teeth and jaw building a complete picture of my teeth and jaw which is then sent electronically to the lab who then print my new crown on a 3D printer! How cool is that. In doing the scan the dentist spots a cavity at the top of one of my front teeth. We have a quick chat and decide to add it to todays work. My dentist moves on to the planned filling and when that is done she moves to the front tooth. Its the full hour I’ve had my mouth full of metal and tools and now I’m numbed and sore. I make the appointment to return for my 3D crown and return to reception to pay for todays work.

I walk home and rest as I Am due a COVID booster this afternoon. I make myself boiled egg and soldiers (magic food) for lunch and then spend more time reading. I am thinking about getting ready to go to the GP for my jab when my partner returns from seeing her mother. She taps on the window and beckons me to come to the door quietly. There on the doorstep is a hedgehog, not our regular hog but a small one, probably this years. Unusual to see this nocturnal chap out in broad daylight, so I am concerned about his health. I dash to the Shed to get some hedgehog food and on my way back I trip over the electricity table and take a painful tumble. I tuck and roll and its my ribs that take the brunt. I put food and water down for the small hog and drop some on the path to encourage the little hog to eat. The hog eats a bit but then wanders slowly into the pots. I create a little shelter for the hog reasoning that it might want some cover until dark comes around.

I am pushed for time so I have to leave the hog and hope he/she is alright and make my way to the GP surgery for my jab. The walk down is short and the process of actually getting my COVID is even shorter, I barely have time to get my arm uncovered and the needle is in. I walk home beginning to feel a bit knockabout. When I go for a piss I find the tumble I took earlier has made me pass blood. I take myself off to the spare room, take my vitals, down a pint of orange squash adn read for a while, stopping only to nibble crisps and to drink another pint of water. Eventually I return to my place on the sofa and begin to drat the blog. Dinner arrives and I eat with a football match playing in the background. The hedgehog seems to have moved on with the onset of darkness. With the dark comes the feeling of cold, a runny nose and the sense that tonight must be an early night and rest before I take the car to Kwik Fit tomorrow morning. For now I must look after me, I suspect my ribs are going to be bruised in the morning, needless to say I’ll find out soon enough.